Notes from an Undergrad

It’s a pretty simple question really. When you make a decision, do you think of what the president will think, or how it will benefit your students?

Many times, the president doesn’t get it.

Let’s be honest–summer reading programs are total bullshit. Here’s how they work:

A group of administrators and higher-ed staff form a committee. This committee reads about seven to eight books (most only reading the two or three that have the most appealing “diverse” covers). Then they collectively decide on one book the incoming freshmen are going to have to read. The book discussion is poorly implemented and not integrated into one or more of every student’s core classes. The author will then visit in early fall and only a small portion of the freshmen class will actually come to see them, unless of course you require that too. And 99.9% of the time, this is done without any undergraduate student feedback whatsoever.

Oh, did I mention your freshmen will largely not appreciate summer homework, as well as an additional $7-$13 on their shocking textbook bill? They don’t care. And they don’t care because subconsciously they know why you’re doing a summer reading program.

You’re doing it to do it. You’re doing it so you can say you did it. So you can say you tried. But it doesn’t work. Here’s a little test to figure out if you should kill your program or not:

1. Is this a book that first-year students had a hand in choosing?
2. Are you choosing the a summer reading book because it’s the most “diverse” experience you think your students will have all fall?
3. Is the book going to be integrated into one or more of every first year student’s core classes?
4. Are you loosely tying your campus PR themes to the themes of the novel (The book is about diversity, and we “Promote learning about other cultures”)?
5. Will this alleviate undue stress your program places on other student success offices on campus (in other words, it’s your program but it’s up to your first year orientation program to handle the book discussions)?

For the odd questions, Yes = 0, No = 1
For the even questions, No = 0, Yes = 1

If you have even one point, kill your summer reading program. The only type of college in a reasonable position to pull something like this off in a meaningful way, is a small community college. Period. All you’re doing in every other situation is reaching the students who like to read or who the book touches directly (Wow, a book that directly relates to my life may reach me!). But you’re pissing off the majority rest. Stop it, stop it now.

Your eyes are pretty amazing. In fact, in near darkness your peripheral vision will still have a strong ability to detect motion. It’s crazy stuff.

Like your peripheral vision, service learning is pretty amazing. See, our natual bias is to ourselves. We care about ourselves, so we focus on ourselves and what we want. When you ask a student to redirect their focus, to help someone else, you give them the opportunity to look at themselves through their peripheral vision. It gives them a better sense of where they are and where they’re going.

Anyways, just a thought.

Overheard:

Treat your graduate students like they’re colleagues. Treat your undergrads like they’re graduate students.

Well…why not?

I say “teaching” faculty loosely, because a significant number do anything but. It blows my mind that college level teachers, who are presumed experts in their field, and who are preparing their students to further their future careers, are not trained to teach.

There are rigid standards at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. Not only do these educators have to complete rigorous degree programs before teaching, but they must also achieve and renew licensure. But to teach at the college level, you merely need a degree or two in your field.

Sometimes you don’t even need that.

And sometimes a firm grasp of the English language isn’t even a requirement.

The big problem here is that these faculty are supposed to actually teach their students something. At this point so much research has been done on the concept of active learning that I don’t even need to quote anyone to say the standard lecture course is not effective. There are even reports that students taking these courses retain less than 50% of what they “learn” just a semester later.

Obviously good teaching promotes an environment for good learning. So why aren’t we teaching faculty how to teach? Some colleges and universities have faculty development departments, but few actually do anything with them. So here’s what I propose:

When a new faculty is hired on, give them a light first semester in return for undergoing a semester-long training program with a mentor from their department. Make the training optional if you want, but if they go through it they should receive at least some credit or kudos for future tenure. It’s really that simple. The departments have to commit to developing effective teaching programs, or they may as well stick with the same old classes that do the same old things. But to paraphrase Skip Downing: “If you keep doing what you’ve been doing, you’ll keep getting the same results. So what will you do differently?“

There are thousands of colleges and universities nationwide, and they each have unique strengths and weaknesses. We can’t expect every school to have the same cultural DNA. Now there are some schools that do a few things really well, like advising or FIGs. There are also schools that fall short in those areas. But they almost universally share one problem: A lack of support from the Administration.

The guilt tends to increase as you move higher up the chain of command. Essentially you end up with administrators or presidents who demand ask for a new initiative, maybe something designed to improve retention or student success. They pass the work down the chain until you get to the program coordinators. This is when the administration begins to look a bit unreasonable.

First, they want the coodinator(s) to develop and implement an initiative, often within a year or less. But they rarely increase their department’s budget. This means the coordinators can’t hire extra staff to offset the additional workload they must now take on, or to commission new research.

Administrators also have a tendency to forget these coordinators are already managing other initiatives. They typically take a hands-off approach to development, except during project update meetings where they’re more than willing to offer input on a project they actively choose to have no part of. It’s not okay to expect a program to work when you won’t support it.

The key to a successful initiative is an administration and president that are committed to its success. An absence of this commitment has led to the demise of countless meaningful programs.

Alright, so we’ve established the pattern of sabotage. Below are four commitments I expect administrators to make when ordering a new initiative.

1. Commit Your Faith: Trust your program coordinators to do their jobs. They’re the content experts at your university, and they (should) know more than you do about their field.

2. Commit Your Budget: New programs don’t magically appear. The department(s) you’ve asked to develop your new program are already working on their current initiatives. Creating something new involves extensive research, and significant development time. This cuts away from work time. An expanded budget allows a department to hire on new people (at the least some student workers), or to outsource some of the research to a professional company. I hate feeling like I’m stating the obvious, but sometimes it seems like it’s not obvious at all.

3. Commit Yourself: If you’re not willing to take an active role in this project, don’t ask for it. Being involved isn’t limited to getting a status update every month or so. It’s also about making sure you are doing everything you can to help this program be as successful as possible.

4. Commit Time: Notice I didn’t use “your” there. Let me be blunt: If you’re not willing to give a new program at least five years to develop and prove its value, don’t ask for it.

Alright, so this is a blog about Higher Education. And presumably, you have something to do with higher ed (that would be the ideal scenario). Since I’m new to the world of blogging, I feel compelled to give you a bit of primer before you really dive into any of my posts. So here goes the who, why, and what:

Who am I?

I’m an undergrad at a public, midwest university. The enrollment here is about 35,000 students, give or take. Over the past four years I’ve been fortunate enough to work in one of the largest offices on campus, where much of my work has been devoted to student success programs. I’ve even presented at a national conference or two.

Why bother with this blog?

I’ve become increasingly aware of the problems that exist in the world of higher ed. These problems are expanding in scope and severity, and can normally be traced back to one common issue: The administration doesn’t understand their students.

What do I want to accomplish?

It would be easy to make a blog where I piss and moan about the evils out there and blah blah blah. I’ve read blogs like that. I hate blogs like that. They’re not constructive. I believe you are obligated to offer a solution if you take it upon yourself to actively complain about a problem. This is the standard I’m trying to live up to with my writing.

Finally, I’m new at this. I’ve already said that but I feel it bears repeating. Over the coming weeks the site’s layout will see several minor updates, and I’m not too likely to do much evangelizing until I have a few articles posted.